Until recently, the Batmobile in next year's Batman: Arkham Knight - the headline-grabbing addition in the final chapter to Rocksteady's adventure series - has been mostly used to roam the larger, sprawling next-gen vision of Gotham City.

But an early-game mission - which sees Batman explore a hostile-filled chemicals facility at the edge of the city - shows it's more than a means of going from A to B, proving instrumental in infiltration, puzzle solving and combating criminals.

For starters, the Batmobile has a deployable winch, which when latched onto the dead end of a bridge to create a ramp, and followed by the well-timed use of an afterburner, sees the Batmobile rocket over a huge expanse and land inside the chemical plant's gates. It seems that you need it to reach certain areas in Arkham Knight's expanded open-world.

Once inside, the Batmobile proves ideal for quickly zipping through courtyards and a network of chemical pipes that stretch to the outer edges of the facility.

Naturally, there's resistance throughout in the form of missile-wielding vehicles, but a special Battle Mode sees the Batmobile turn into an agile battle tank that makes short work of them with its own homing projectiles.

The most impressive showcase of the Batmobile, perhaps, is when Batman is on foot. When it's exploring indoors, it can be called and controlled remotely to help blow up walls that expose switches and new routes to progress onward.

Provided it's sitting outside, it can even spice up Batman's acclaimed combat, where an uppercut can be stylishly finished off with a blast of a missile while the thug is mid-air. (These missiles will only stun, so don't worry about Batman suddenly turning homicidal now he's got his driving licence.)

Batman in the Arkham games has always felt a little on the stiff side, so it's impressive how quickly he can transition from car to combat. A simple button press will allow you to smoothly eject from the Batmobile, slide into an air duct and go straight into a combo, and you can return just as quickly whenever you decide to leap back onto the streets.

While the transition between fighting and exploring is fluid, actually controlling the Batmobile might come with a small learning curve.

It accelerates as you'd expect from a car in a game - with a pull of the right trigger - but to brake you need to press a face button (on PS4, this is Square).

This is because holding the left trigger transforms the car into its aforementioned Battle Mode, where handling changes to something similar to a third-person shooter, with the two sticks to turn and strafe and the right trigger to fire off cannon shots.

Adjusting between the two styles is a little confusing at first, and becomes even more so when summoning the Batmobile while Batman is elsewhere.

Puzzles that require the vehicle's winch or projectiles begin with a series of button presses - starting with a shoulder button, to a move of an analogue stick on a radial wheel followed by a tap of a face button - before you then remember how to select one of the many toys the Batmobile has at its disposal.

On the bright side, using it in combat is really easy - it's simply part of a combo that flashes on-screen, and at the very least that sequence of switching between Bat and car highlights the sheer range of abilities now available to Batman in Arkham Knight.

This limited early-game slice proves the Batmobile isn't just a fun ride, but an indispensable and cleverly-implemented weapon in the Dark Knight's battle to save Gotham.

Batman: Arkham Knight will be available on PS4, Xbox One and PC in early 2015.